Open shelving in the kitchen is a bit of a love-it-or-leave-it idea, and whether it’s practical or not comes largely down to how you use your kitchen. But if you do want to incorporate floating shelves, a question emerges: Where should you hang them? There are many great places to put open shelves, and this guide will help you determine the best spot in your kitchen.

With natural light so highly sought after, it’s important to maximize whatever window real estate your kitchen has. Bulky upper cabinets can box in your windows, blocking light from entering the space as fully as it could. Floating shelves, however, allow light to pour in through your windows into the space at all angles.

This means you can put storage tight to the window (rather than leaving a big gap around the sides) without blocking the light. For maximum openness, use a roll-down shade on or in the window frame rather than a hanging curtain.

This around-the-window strategy is especially useful if your window is placed in a corner of the room or another awkward spot, which can happen in older buildings that have been converted to townhomes or basement apartments, or other kitchens where the windows are not where one would usually expect. Giving it some breathing room will make the best of the window you have, and you can let another element be the feature.

Some people like to see a range hood hidden away in a cabinet. Others like to make it a visual feature. If you like a beautiful exposed hood, surrounding it with shelves can complete the look to make a true feature wall. This approach also leaves the hood viewable from more angles (as opposed to surrounding it with cabinets, much like the previous tip).

For those who spend a lot of time at the cooktop, it can also be nicer to spend time facing into an airy area of shelves rather than having a lot of cabinetry in your face.

It can also be very practical to have open shelving here for the convenience of being able to grab a spice, tool or other cooking essential quickly with one hand rather than having to fish through cabinets.

The sink is another area where a lot of time is spent in the kitchen. If you don’t have a window above your sink, breaking up the cabinets with a small stretch of shelves can make this area feel more open. When you’re peeling vegetables or hand-washing a large pot, you’ll appreciate having some attractive accents displayed in front of you rather than a solid stretch of cabinets inches from your face.

Homes often have odd “complex” corners, or shifts in the wall caused by structural posts or other architectural elements that make the walls change direction multiple times. This is especially common in condos and apartments.

In this example you can see that the blue painted area was made into a shelf feature. It’s much easier to have simple shelves cut to follow a complex shape than to try to have cabinets custom fitted, and the result shows the personality of your space instead of covering it up.

When using stock cabinets, it can be difficult to perfectly fill the available wall space (which is often an arbitrary number of inches) with cabinets that come in widths usually starting at 12 or 15 inches wide.

One smart solution is to fill the last few inches of space (say, an 11-inch gap at the end of a beautiful row of matching 24- to 36-inch cabinets) with open shelves in a contrasting material to create an attractive accent that anchors the edge like a bookend. Splurging on this add-on can make a kitchen with stock cabinets feel completely custom.

Who says shelves have to be anchored to a wall? Hanging shelves from the ceiling over your island puts storage in a handy spot for those who do a lot of cooking or prep work at the island. If you hang them just above eye level, they’ll still be reachable without crowding your view.

This is also a great place to put dishes or glassware so they can easily be grabbed by a guest who may not know which cabinet to look in otherwise, and without even having to step foot into the kitchen.

If you have a peninsula, you can also consider putting shelves along this wall to serve a similar function without cutting off any sight lines.

This can be a great place to mix some storage (for mugs, cups, and other beverage supplies) with art or family photos and mementos to create a functional and decorative display space in the central hub of a busy home.

Have a low or slanted ceiling to contend with? This is another area where it can be tough and expensive to fit in a cabinet, but a breeze to add a few shelves.

Shelves already look great when sized to different widths, like in this example, so they’re a perfect fit for angled areas. Notice how this composition uses a framed photo on one end to continue the visual triangle, following the shape of the ceiling even higher for a casually elegant effect.

This idea will be controversial to some people, but if you ask me, it’s a beautiful one. If you have windows that let in great light, but maybe not the most exciting view (such as a building next door), stretching shelving across the window changes the whole look without losing the natural light.

It’s a cool look for modern spaces but also works in more traditional homes. Just make sure your window will still be operable with the shelving in place. This can actually be a smart solution to dress a window that might otherwise always be hidden behind a closed curtain.

To keep as much light as possible, use these shelves to stack items like clear glassware or serving dishes, which will refract the view but let the light pour in.

Wondering what to do with a corner of an L- or U-shaped kitchen? Corner cabinets can sometimes be hard to access, but an L-shaped shelf lets you see and grab anything stashed away, even the items tucked right into the corner itself. No more rooting around in a deep corner cabinet, and no need for fancy pull-out systems. Just a little cutting and seaming to get a shelf that fits just right.

Sometimes all you need (or really want) is just a few short shelves to store some basics, with most of your storage still behind closed doors. What better place to hang these shelves than over a single station in the kitchen, like a coffee station, snack bar or breakfast nook? Shelves like these with exposed hardware can go up in a snap with just a few screws, and while they may not be able to hold up a heavy mixer, they can hold a few boxes and bowls for just the right dash of casual style.

Have a very small galley kitchen. Narrow cabinets do not allow dish storage. Want to put a suspended shelf from a drop down above the peninsula/sink. How and what type of material can I use for shelf suspension? It would be one long shelf to hold dishes and glassware. The one featured above in "Above the Island" is what I would like to do, but only one shelf. What are those anchors that are in the ceiling?